Meteorological Phenomena of the Blight
"It was a common passtime of sciencers of the past to guess and wonder and try to find meaning in the capriciously deceptive patterns of the weather. Our philosophers might be tempted to do the same, had the blight not infected everything with its chaotic madness--if there is a pattern, it is far too complex for any mind we've yet encountered to comprehend." -- C-E Thom Tallis, Chief Archivist on Matters of Blightweed Containment Protocol Phenomena Associated with Blightweed Reproductive Cycle In the temporal vicinity of reproductive activity of the Blightweed, many strange phenomena have been documented. However, since all biological cycles of the plant have been shown to occur on a geometrically inverse logarithmic timescale, the initiation of any stage of its growth tends to catch the attending archivist unawares, unless it has been properly monitored from germination. When the juvenile blightweed reaches maturity, it begins to release a sort of plant-pheromone which is visible to human instruments in the radio and microwave spectra (some of the attending archivists have reported that the music they were listening to changed to Cavendish Era love songs during the plant's transition into sexual maturity; obviously, the implications of blight-effects at this level on Proto-Sapient Artforms could be disastrous to the medium, which prompted the moratorium on music-capable devices within facilities that study blightweed). Once the plant reaches sexual maturity, a stage which is marked by the development of spore pustules all along its light-facing surface area, the radiation of plant-pheromones begins to take on a unique structure, which becomes clearer once th pustules burst and the spores are released. Just after the plant releases the spores, it begins to produce a sticky, acrid-smelling foam, which contains the sperm of the plant. Over the course of the next part of the cycle, the plant covers itself in a thick layer of the spermatofoam, which will continue to slough off of it until a sufficient number of spores from a genetically dissimilar plant adhere to the foam. The first couple of times this process was observed, there was, sadly, only the one blightweed plant in the observation compound. Human losses in these instances were extreme, but the outbreak was contained before a total containment breach could occur, as it was--tragically--discovered that human DNA is an acceptable substitute for blightweed spores in a pinch. However, the resulting offspring were viewed as abominations and quickly destroyed. Phenomena Associated with Emotional Instability of Parent Plant Following a large surge in blightweed population or groundcover, it is often observed that clouds in the vicinity will begin to scintillate through the visual spectrum. Considering the close ties between plant-pheromones and EM radiation as outlined above, this phenomena of Prismatic Cloud Cover is thought to be caused by a similar mechanism. Other times this specific phenomena has been observed include large outbreaks of Eye Blight and the successful end of a reproductive cycle. Archivists have come to associate this prismatic phenomenon with times when the blightweed is "happy". On the other end of the emotional spectrum, Cloud-Sucking (see picture above) is supposedly caused by blightweed in some state of distress. This phenomenon appears most pronounced above the directly-affected blightweed patch, but has never been observed around captive blightweed, perhaps due to low humidity levels in the research facilities. Documented instances of Cloud-Sucking have occured simultaneous to or directly following human victories in the fight against the plant, the completion of development of Karl Mercel's seed, and the capture and imprisonment for study of small specimens of the plant. These phenomena are usually observed worldwide, near all blightweed patches simultaneously, implying that the plants are somehow linked. Whether the link is electromagnetic, telepathic, through subspace, or occurs by some other unkown means, no engineer or archivist has yet discovered. Phenomena Associated with Eye Blight By far the most common meteorological phenomena associated with blightweed are its effects on the human mind once Eye Blight has been contracted. The hallucinations produced in its victims tend to express themselves in external reality as actual weather phenomena (as in the Mushroom Clouds, pictured right). Apparently sometime during the Cavendish Era, a great prophet foretold of this time in an illustrated children's book that became one of their "talkies". The events of that story have now come to pass, though those involved in the reality of it did not think that food raining from the heavens was as whimsical as it may have sounded to Cavendish children. Citations Blightweed Cavendish Era Eye Blight Karl Mercel